Xplora wrote:because there are two sides to every argument, and we need to accept the research at hand.

Correction to that. We need to question and critique any research conclusions to establish their validity.

The validity of the conclusion (that cyclists who don't wear helmets are likely to take more risks) is entirely valid, but that is correlation, and not causality, ie helmets do not cause helmet wearers to take less risks, risk averse people are simply more likely to wear helmets. ie I wouldn't even bother to read the study to try find errors with that, because I feel its extremely unlikely to be an incorrect conclusion.

Another detected correlation is the tendency for people that have lit lights on their cycles to have less severe accidents (and probably less accidents) during broad daylight, because fitting lights is correlated with peoples ability to perceive risks, as is the frequency and severity of their accidents.

As it turns out, dutch accident and head injury rates for cycling without helmets (by trip or by kms) are vastly better than ours with helmets, which is an example of why offloading what should be infrastructure safety to PPG is a poor governmental level practice.

zero wrote:The validity of the conclusion (that cyclists who don't wear helmets are likely to take more risks) is entirely valid, but that is correlation, and not causality, ie helmets do not cause helmet wearers to take less risks, risk averse people are simply more likely to wear helmets

However they are also drawing the reverse conclusion - that people who don't wear helmets take more risks, and using it as an argument to mandate helmets. If all those Dutch cyclists suddenly wore helmets (by some miracle) this will not make them any safer cyclists. Safety comes from your attitudes and behaviours, not from what you wear.

zero wrote:...which is an example of why offloading what should be infrastructure safety to PPG is a poor governmental level practice.

+1. But, as a plus, it's made decent helmets very affordable.

I doubt Australian laws or standards have had significant impacts on the global helmet supply picture. I'm guessing that the UCI has had more impact with that stuff.

il Pad, by all means, question the research, but accept it for what it is. In a certain set of conditions, a certain result will be found. Given that most helmet related research is intended to defend the helmet, I'm sure that most of the published work will reinforce defence of the helmet. The conclusions we derive can be very different to those drawn by the researchers. Very well worth bearing in mind that the recommendations by researchers are essentially IRRELEVANT to the paper, because they are always based on opinion. There are facts, there are reasoned conclusions, and there are opinions about how those conclusions should be applied. They are also made in a vacuum; they don't account for 3rd party effects (such as more riders = more safety). The key is more research to control for more 3rd party effects. Twizzle, my opinions about the research data are just as valid as the researcher's, because there is no training necessary to interpret a correlation. (BTW, glad you're OK. Black outs SUCK)

Zero, you're bang on the money with the comments about correlations. There are a truckload of correlations with any safety based comparison, because it doesn't function in a vacuum. The kinds of people who will use a light in the daytime have a different safety profile. It also ignores basic facts like "car drivers have a freaking responsibility to see the traffic, even if it is hard to see!" which has an impact. It deflects basic responsibility onto the victim sometimes.

Xplora wrote:Ross, you really must READ the responses. If you cannot understand why someone would make a choice different to you, "I" cannot understand how someone with a reasonable grasp of English like yourself can fail to process a simple explanation that has been reiterated DOZENS OF TIMES. This has been specifically directed at you as well. If you are a sook, and refuse to ride without a helmet, "that is your choice". I think it is a daft choice. But you are entitled to make it, and it doesn't impact on me. The reverse also applies.

If you want to be obtuse and talk about impacts on social costs from my lack of helmet, I will throw that back at you - your obsession with helmeted riding is actually hurting cyclists as car drivers falsely believe that the act of riding a bike causes brain trauma, rather than the act of being hit by a car and forced off the bike by 2 tonnes of alloy. The social impact of crappy drivers is FAR FAR FAR higher than the social impact of nude nuts.

So let's avoid being obtuse, because there are two sides to every argument, and we need to accept the research at hand. More riders equals safer roads. Helmets improve individual consequences, but influence people to simply not ride, creating a net loss for the remaining cycling population.

I fail to see the value in research like the SMH article reports, when there is no attempt to address the more controversial research such as "more riders equals more safety for cyclists". Research is most valuable in the counterintuitive results, not the confirmation of common sense.

I have READ all the responses (great cure for insomnia BTW ). il padrone and others that are opposed to MHL claim they regualrly wear helmets when cycling, they just don't like being told they HAVE to, by law. Without wanting or meaning to get personal this sounds like a childish tantrum. I was a bit like that when MHLs first came in and I rode around for a couple of years or so without a helmet but eventually like to think I matured and decided I should start wearing one. They don't cost that much (like most things, you can spend a lot of money on them if you want), they are a small inconvenience granted (in the same way a blowfly is, so not much really) but you never know when you might need it (as I have had a couple of times over the years).

Sorry if I'm being obtuse. As I've mentioned in previous posts we need laws to protect us from ourselves. Should we abolish compulsary seat belt laws. maybe speed limits too, it's inconvenient to drive at 100km/h, I would much prefer to do 200km/h. What about gun laws. Having quite lax gun laws doesn't appear to work in America.

I don't expect to sway anyone to my way of thinking, just putting my POV across. Not obsessive. We can count my posts on the subject and then count yours, il padrone, human909 and yours and see who is obsessed.

Ross wrote: They don't cost that much (like most things, you can spend a lot of money on them if you want), they are a small inconvenience granted (in the same way a blowfly is, so not much really) but you never know when you might need it (as I have had a couple of times over the years).

Spoken from the point of view of the cycling enthusiasts that you and I are. In order to get cycling to become a meaningful urban transport mode we need non-enthusiasts.... ordinary people to take up cycling en-masse. The requirement to wear a helmet (mandated) is a simple deterrent. They cost a bit extra, they are inconvenient (need to be carried, stored, looked after), they mess people's hair up and make people feel hotter. This is a bother for many folks.

Ross wrote:Sorry if I'm being obtuse. As I've mentioned in previous posts we need laws to protect us from ourselves. Should we abolish compulsary seat belt laws. maybe speed limits too, it's inconvenient to drive at 100km/h, I would much prefer to do 200km/h. What about gun laws. Having quite lax gun laws doesn't appear to work in America.

We need laws to protect us from ourselves, only if there is a demonstrated safety problem, and the laws will be the most effective way to produce a net social benefit. Car seat-belt laws, speed limits and even gun laws (in Australia) can be demonstrated to have achieved these criteria.

Ross wrote:il padrone and others that are opposed to MHL claim they regualrly wear helmets when cycling, they just don't like being told they HAVE to, by law. Without wanting or meaning to get personal this sounds like a childish tantrum.

Ross, stop and think about it for a second. Surely you recognise that allowing choice in life is a good thing? Or do you believe that we should have our lives dictate to us by the government? Il padrone and others aren't being childish they are supporting FREEDOM and wish to encourage cycling to a wider audience.

Ross wrote:As I've mentioned in previous posts we need laws to protect us from ourselves.

No we don't. Saying that we need laws to protect us from ourselves says that the government knows more about keeping me safe than I do and has more incentive to keep me safe than I do. It doesn't. Speed and guns controls and many other laws are sensible because they protect you from others.

Also following the argument that we need laws to protect us from ourselves most higher risk sports wouldn't exist or be so crazily regulated that it would be insane.

'Academia' has no interest in in pulling the study apart. There is no funding in tearing apart government funded "road safety" research. To call any of this academic research is a stretch.

Yes - it's all a conspiracy!

twizzle wrote:And not point scoring, just pointing out that pulling "evidence" out of thin air isn't helping the discussion... and never has.

Nobody is pulling "evidence" out of thin air. The quote you pick on wasn't even presented as "evidence".

In the context of Belief vs Evidence. You, once again, made something up and presented it as a fact. You could be right, but given how hard it is to get stopped by the police, you could also be wrong. Stop presenting opinions as facts!

Edit:typo. Edit2: Bloody unbalanced quotes!Sent from my iThingy...

Last edited by twizzle on Wed Feb 06, 2013 11:25 am, edited 2 times in total.

'Academia' has no interest in in pulling the study apart. There is no funding in tearing apart government funded "road safety" research. To call any of this academic research is a stretch.

Yes - it's all a conspiracy!

No it isn't a conspiracy nor has it been suggested as such. It is simply true that the government does fund organisations and research that whose goals are to increase regulation not decrease them.

twizzle wrote:In the context of Belief vs Evidence. You, once again, made something up and presented it as a fact.

You keep claiming this like a broken record. Yet somehow ignore that the research presented has only a few few biased statistics to lead to false conclusions. This is not "evidence". In contrast most of Europe is direct evidence that life without MHL need not be a dire thing for cyclists.

twizzle wrote:A mate a work suggests you go and live in Singapore for a while. Look into why they are a nanny state. Ask why it is necessary to have sensors in lifts in office buildings to catch people urinating.

In all fairness, that is not a nanny state example. The state is being a nanny when laws/regulations are enacted to protect you from yourself, not protect you from others. Enforcing helmet use on bicycles is the former. Stopping people urinating in lifts is the latter.

I took a fall on the weekend. Hit my head. Was unconscious for 1-2 minutes. The brand new helmet is busted

Yes it saved me from possibly more severe injuries. I have a broken collar-bone and possible cracked ribs. Still do not support MHL. I choose to wear a helmet. I am a high mileage rider (10-12k per year) and the fall happened while descending a gravel road out of the bush into Apollo Bay - not your garden variety 'ride to the shops'. I guess it can be seen as greater risk-taking, descending a gravel road at 30kmh. I accept that risk and deal with it. Abolishing the MHL will not change that.

snipped

That is a bad fall and will take some getting over. Getting over some cracked ribs myself from a tangle foot fall at home in the back yard.( Bloody thongs) The hardest part is to only sleep on my back. Finding I have to get up and sleep upright in the lounge chair. Hope you recover well. How do they treat a broken collar bone, does it require a ss pin put in during an opp?

You hear it in the media from shock-jocks and their diarist lackiys "How is it that people can be allowed to do this sort of thing?" Eg. commentary after the recent rescue of the French yachtsmen whose yacht capsized and had to be abandoned in storm and was rescued by a cruise ship.

Bull fighting and train surfing are not legal due to reasons other than being hazardous sports. Base jumping is one of the VERY few sports that are banned in Australia solely for the risk to the individual participants.

There are hundreds of unregulated sports that are significantly greater risk than cycling. Many of them participants are at high risk of head injuries. But individual choices work very well in keeping people largely safe!

human909 wrote:Base jumping is one of the VERY few sports that are banned in Australia solely for the risk to the individual participants.

So you agree with me. Great

Therefore, it is insane.

I wasn't agreeing with you! I don't believe base jumping should be banned. Personally I think it is a reckless sport and I have no desire to participate in it. But I don't believe that it is the government's job to tell us how to live our lives. How is a life of education, work, beach holidays, kids and retirement "better" than one of adventure possibly cut short but an accident?

Personally I do serious outdoor rockclimbing. The government, authorities and the general public think this is dangerous. But what do they know?

twizzle wrote:A mate a work suggests you go and live in Singapore for a while. Look into why they are a nanny state. Ask why it is necessary to have sensors in lifts in office buildings to catch people urinating.

In all fairness, that is not a nanny state example. The state is being a nanny when laws/regulations are enacted to protect you from yourself, not protect you from others. Enforcing helmet use on bicycles is the former. Stopping people urinating in lifts is the latter.

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